SourceBestiary 4 pg. 101The most fearsome drow aren’t satisfied with the mere defeat and death of their foes, preferring to defile their enemies in horrific ways. The most gruesome form of transformation assaults their enemies’ very essence through the complicated process of fleshwarping.

Fleshwarping is the practice of altering a creature’s physical form and mental state by way of a grisly mystical and alchemical process. It starts with submerging the subject in a vat filled with a magical and alchemical goo concocted of strange reagents, and infused with a multitude of living insects and other vermin. The goo dissolves and reshapes the flesh and bone of the subject while the vermin eat away at unwanted flesh, making way for the new, alchemically grown flesh to take hold. The process is torturous, and the subject is kept alive and conscious throughout it.

Depending on the base creature being fleshwarped, the heinous process lasts days, weeks, or even months. The entire time, it’s overseen by a fleshwarper—a craftsperson whose perverse curiosity trumps any regard for life or sanity. This fleshwarper pokes and prods at the subject, flaying the skin and committing other atrocious tortures when necessary, manipulating the vermin as needed, and making sure the mix of reagents in the fleshwarping goo is correct at every stage of the occult process. Once the process is complete, the transformed abomination is expected to free itself from the fleshwarping goo; those that fail to do so are summarily slaughtered.

The end result is something both more and less than the base form. Though the process is basically the same for every type of creature the drow experiment on, the results are drastically different. A fleshwarped drow becomes a drider. A fleshwarped elf becomes an irnakurse, and a fleshwarped troglodyte becomes a ghonhatine. Some races seem to resist the process of fleshwarping altogether—dwarves have never been successfully fleshwarped, and most fey are particularly resilient to the process. What is generally true about fleshwarping is that inherently evil creatures that go through the process tend to be more useful to the drow than those who start out good. The most useful of the fleshwarps are those created from other drow. These unfortunate subjects are typically those who fail their house or are born with physical or mental defects. Unlike other fleshwarps, who tend to be sterile or lack the organs or ability to procreate, driders are a race unto themselves and are capable of procreation.

The process of creating a fleshwarp is dangerous to the base creature and expensive for the creator. During the process, the subject is wracked with excruciating pain, and takes 2d6 points of Constitution damage (Fortitude DC 15 half ). The reagents that constitute the goo cost at least 10,000 gp, and the rarer specimens of vermin used to facilitate fleshwarping can cost just as much if bought on the open market.

It’s often said that the drow learned the gruesome art of fleshwarping as a reward for obscene pacts they made with some demon lord, but the identity of the demon lord who bestowed knowledge of the foul process changes with each telling of the tale.

There are other cultures that also understand and use fleshwarping, but they tend to be either ancient or very secretive and xenophobic. Sinspawn, fleshdregs, and the lamia-based hungerer are just some examples of non-drow fleshwarps.

Fleshwarp Bestiary

Drow fleshwarpers continually experiment to discover new fleshwarps. Here is a list of the most common fleshwarps.

Drider (drow): Driders are the first and most numerous of the fleshwarped creatures created by the drow. They are the only fleshwarped creatures known to breed true.Ghonhatine (troglodytes): These fleshwarps are nearly twice the size of troglodytes and are far more bestial and fearsome.Gomnits (gnomes): Gnomes subjected to this process are transformed into something that resembles a vicious, mushroom-like humanoid.Grothlut (humans): Fleshwarped humans are transformed into mindless, sluglike things.Gublasks (goblins): Goblins transformed by fleshwarping grow a chitinous skin, and their arms are transformed into whiplike stingers.Halsora (vegepygmies): Fleshwarped vegepygmies grow stockier and stronger, and their sunken eyes release a stream of acidic black tears.Irnakurse (elves): Drow particularly prize these tentacled treelike horrors created from their hated kin.Jashoi (halfling): Fleshwarped halflings become bizarre, doglike quadrupeds which are annoying and difficult to control. As a result, drow rarely fleshwarp halflings.Oronci (orcs): An oronci has the upper body of an orc and the lower body of a centipede, complete with poisonous spittle.Urgoci (ogre): An ogre’s hind legs shrink down to vestigial stumps. Its forearms lengthen, and are used to pull the vestigial lower body along. A mass of serpentine tentacles sprouts from its shoulders and upper torso.

Ecology

Special Abilities

Digestive Spew (Ex) In order to ingest food, a grothlut must first regurgitate its digestive liquids upon its victim. As a standard action, it can spit these liquids on a creature within 5 feet. This spew deals 3d6 acid damage (Reflex DC 15 half). The save DC is Constitution-based.

Disgusting Demise (Ex) When a grothlut reaches 0 or fewer hit points, its digestive organs rupture, freeing alchemical agents that have a violent effect on the rest of the grothlut’s internal organs and flesh. This causes an explosion of grothlut viscera within a 30-foot-radius burst of the creature. Though this viscera deals no damage, it’s disgusting to behold and its smell can cause living creatures within that radius to become nauseated for 1d4 rounds (Fortitude DC 14 negates). This is a poison effect. The save DC is Constitution-based.

Piteous Moan (Su) Whenever a grothlut sees another creature, it begins to moan as free action. Anyone within 60 feet who can hear the moan must succeed at a DC 15 Will saving throw or become sickened by the moaning for as long as she can hear it. Every two additional grothluts with the area increase the DC by 1, to a maximum of DC 18. This is a mindaffecting sonic effect. The save DC is Constitution-based.

Description

Grothluts are sluglike abominations with vaguely human heads and torsos, and rubbery arms that move awkwardly at their sides. They shuff le mindlessly until other creatures come into view, then piteously moan before slithering forward to attack and feed. Those moans are the last vestige of their formerly human selves crying for release as slivers of the creatures’ intellects are forced to continuously relive their transformation.

Many fleshcrafters consider the grothlut a failure, as the transformation all but stamps out its human consciousness. Others disagree, arguing that warping the creature’s mind makes it more useful, as its stupidity makes it pliable and easy to herd. The drow typically use grothluts only as guardians to slowly patrol the remote edges of their enclaves. Once in position, though, grothluts can be used as crude shock troops, unleashed to soften enemy forces before more valuable warriors wade in and cut down the enemies who have been nauseated by the grothluts’ exploded organs and flesh.